When all else fails
by kstefan88
Summary: A story about Tabitha's thoughts about and feelings for her one and only Captain, the one she owes her life to; set during the time skip - at the moment. TabithaxMiria.
1. Prologue

Author's notes:

…

Nah, not going to say anything, don't want to spoil you too much :p

Enjoy!

* * *

**Prologue**

It finally is over. It's not like I did not anticipate this. For someone like me to survive something like that was never possible from the very beginning. The 24 of us against an army of Awakened Beings of equal numbers was no battle we could hope to win. Captain Miria knew that from the very beginning. I hope that her plan has saved many of our comrades, she has deserved it! In this icy hell she was the one who gave us hope, even if it was just a little.

Wherever I looked, there were my comrades, either unconscious, dead or fragmented. I gave my all to inflict as much damage to our enemies as possible, in order to protect as many of my comrades as possible. Also I had no intentions of disappointing the person that had enabled us to fight with at least a little bit of comfort in our hearts, so I just forgot about all the fear of dying and just fought. Until I felt my life leave my body.

It pains me a bit that I had to die, but as we promised, no bitterness. Who survives, survives and who dies, dies. Still I wish that I could meet her again... to thank her for giving us the hope that we needed so badly. I was none of the lucky.

But still, I did not expect death to feel like that. Of course I was curious, because I knew that my death might come ever day. I thought that I'd just float around in the darkness forever but now, that I am death, I have to say that it is very... cold. And windy. Somehow it feels to me like I am lying on a solid piece of ground that is covered in snow. Much like the spot I died on...

###

And then my eyes opened. At first I could not believe it: above me there was a sky as clear as a freshly polished mirror and beneath me there was the cold ground of Pieta. The cold wind was blowing all around me and made me feel alive. I had actually made it! I could not even believe it but then the pain in my body gave me the last proof I needed. Groaning I sat myself up and looked around: out of the six other warriors who also had survived, Captain Miria was the first one to catch my attention.

She was on her knees and sobbed. "Seven... even though there were so many" she condemned herself. Her whole body was shaking and her fists clenched. She was asking herself if she couldn't have done more, if that was all, that she was capable of.

It deeply pained me to see her like that. I knew that she had not really expected more than seven warriors to survive, but still she had hoped. But her hope was met with disappointment. And she blamed herself for that. I could feel her pain so well, for a moment I thought it was my own. I wanted to help her, to comfort her, but I couldn't do anything.

It was Deneve who told her that she was not to blame and that it was everyone's good fortune for her to by our leader. Even though she had stopped for a moment, Captain Miria began to cry again and still I could do nothing but watch.

I was not like Deneve who could objectively look at the situation. I was not someone like Clare who could just suppress her emotions. I was just a girl that had the once-in-a-lifetime luck of surviving something we had no chance to survive. And it all was thanks to Captain Miria.


	2. Chapter 1: Captain's grief

**Chapter 1: Captain's grief**

Two months after the war of Pieta something like daily life had taken place in the cave that we called our home. We had found ourselves supplies, some basic tools and some fells to sleep in. The latter were not really necessary, but it was way more comfortable than the ground. In addition to that there weren't many people left in the north who could need them, either. We also got our hands on a few oil lamps. That was fortunate due to dry firewood being rare in the snowy lands of the north.

What we spent our days with was most likely training. Even though she did not really tell us what for, Captain Miria had decided that it would not harm us if we were stronger. I did not know her reasons, either, but I had figured that she wanted us to be prepared for encounters with Awakened Beings or Organization's warriors. Of course we completely suppressed our Yoki but Captain Miria was a cautious person. In addition to that, she still felt responsible for the death of 17 of our comrades and, at any cost, she wanted to prevent anyone else from dying. That was what I believed.

At that day we also did nothing else but fighting each other until total exhaustion. Yuma and me nearly always were the first ones to pass out from sheer stress. Yuma pretty much was the same as me – a low ranking warrior who had survived by pure chance. To the others, especially Captain Miria, we had to feel like millstones around their necks. She did her best to at least give us the condition to keep up with the others, but our progress was slow.

Still, even though it must have been on her nerves, she never lectured us or anything. She always said that she had no means of forcing us, so if we couldn't train anymore we should rest. Yuma mostly took that offer thankfully, but I did not take things that easily. Captain Miria had a reason for wanting us to become strong, so I always stood up again, as soon, as I was able to. I had no right to disappoint her, so I strained myself as much as possible. That went far enough to sometimes make Captain Miria expel me from training, even though I felt like I still could keep going. However, I did not question her decisions. I had no right to do so, because without her I would not have been alive then.

###

Later that day nearly all of us were worn out. Even Captain Miria showed signs of exhaustion. Not only had she supervised our training but, in the meantime, also worked on herself. Somehow she was able to juggle our and her training. She was a person way stronger than I thought to ever be. I admired her for what she had done for us and was doing for us, as if it went without saying. And she was able to do all that even though she had burdened herself with the death of her comrades in Pieta.

For a while I had been thinking about how to lift that burden off her shoulders – or to at least make it lighter. The conclusion I had came to, was, that I had no other choice than to talk to her about it. However, for some reason I did not see, I was not that good at talking to her. Even though she deserved it, I was only able to formally talk to her. But I felt that what she needed was a friend. Even though her closest comrades had already told her that she was not to blame, she still blamed herself. What right did I, as someone she barely knew, have to interfere?

Still, her mental state did not leave me alone. Every evening she visited the graves of the fallen that we had arranged. She did not want anyone to follow her there, likely because she did not want anyone to see how she really felt – even though everyone knew. It pained me to see her like that. And it pained me even more that I had no means of doing something about it. That was what I thought, at least.

That evening should be different. I had built up all the courage I had for her sake. As everyone already was asleep, I pretended to sleep, too. Miria left the cave, as usual, to visit the graves of the fallen. That evening I followed her.

###

Even though it was dark already, I could see her dark figure kneeling in the snow. Above her there hung a shadow of eternal grief, a grief that reflected in the tears she shed. I could only watch her from afar for a while. Suddenly I had become unsure about talking to her in a situation like that. The last thing I had wanted was to embarrass or even hurt her! Still...

I screwed up my courage and walked towards her to place myself just a meter behind her.

"Captain Miria" I whispered.

Appalledly she turned around to meet my gaze. In the moonlight I could see the deep sorrow that her face was painted in. It filled my heart with sadness to see my savior like that. Seeing her made me believe even more that I was doing the right thing.

Captain Miria then turned around to face the graves again and scarcely sobbed: "You have to be exhausted. Go to sleep."

"You are right, I am," I calmly answered, "but you are, too."

I then sat down next to her and regarded the graves together with her.

Miria was still sobbing and trying to swallow her tears to little effect. Of course she was embarrassed. She tried to act like everything was alright and life just went on, but that wasn't the case. We knew about her feelings and she knew that we knew, but still it was hard for her to be seen in a state of weakness. She was our leader, our Captain, the one supposed to be strong, and yet she sat there, condemning herself for something she was not guilty of.

After a few moments I directed my view towards her, addressing her: "Captain..." No, that was wrong. I wanted to be there as her friend, not as her subordinate. "No... Miria" I corrected myself.

She then directed her view towards mine. As our gazes met I got the feeling that something had changed about her, even if it was faint. Maybe... just maybe it made her feel a little more at ease to for once not to be the captain but just Miria.

With a faint smile I asked her: "You are still blaming you for that grave, aren't you?"

Miria just nodded slightly, while blinking once.

I directed my gaze to the ground for a bit and began: "Miria," and then met her gaze again to say: "without you, none of use were still alive."

At that her eyes widened for a bit before she turned away, biting her lower lip. "But still..." she whispered.

"No stills, buts and ifs!" I said a little louder, what made her face me again in surprise.

"When all of us had lost our hope you were the one who brought it back by giving us a chance to survive! The warriors who died did not think of you as the one responsible for their death but of the one who brought them hope again!"

At that I gently laid my left hand onto her right shoulder and deeply looked into her yet again moist eyes: "Miria, to all the warriors of Pieta you are a hero. You gave your all and we will never even think about blaming you for the outcome. We have promised that we would keep the fallen one's memories alive. And we promised each other not to feel bitterness. That also goes for you!"

Miria then closed her eyes as she began to cry again. With her left hand she grabbed my left hand that was still resting on her shoulder. With my free hand I gently pushed her face onto my right shoulder. That way we sat there for a while. I did not do much. I just waited for her to calm down, believing, that a little bit of closeness was all that she needed at that moment.

I had not achieved everything that I wanted. She still felt herself responsible, but at least she was able to openly show her feelings. And to have a good cry.

Still, there was a long way left to go.


	3. Chapter 2: You mustn't be the lone wolf

**Chapter 2: You mustn't be the lone wolf**

Miria's mental condition had not changed much. I had noticed, that, since we had our conversation, she had began to at least consider her being guilty or not again. With not that many results, or so it seemed.

It actually had taken me a lot of effort to make myself talk to her and then, when it most likely was necessary even more, while she was amendable to influence, I yet again had to watch her from afar. Our other comrades seemed to not even had noticed a change in Captain Miria. Was the change I had made that small? There was no way I could leave things as they were. Out of all of us our Captain was the one to suffer the most.

Well, actually there was a small thing that I had just failed to notice right away: she still kept visiting our comrades graves every evening, but from afar I could tell that she did not cry that often anymore. Maybe, that was what I thought then, she would change, bit by bit. All that she needed was most likely the right impulse to change her ways of thinking.

That gave me courage again, but what to do next? I though back and forth until Captain Miria herself gave me the right idea. One day, after our training had ended, I came back to our cave a little earlier, finding Captain Miria who was already eating. That moment I realized, that Captain Miria nearly always was absent during our meals. She took her baths alone and even during training she was mostly busy with her own concerns if she not was giving us new tasks – and since we basically were just fighting each other, there was not much for her to tell us.

It was, like she did not participate in our live as a group at all. You could say, that she was just stuck with us and that she tried to avoid us as good as possible. Of course, everyone of us had her own cross to bear, but no one had to do it alone – but for some reason it seemed like that was exactly what Captain Miria wanted. Not only did she burden herself with many things she had no account for but in addition to that had no intentions of making us carry them, too. Then it finally was clear to my, why she was burdening herself that much, namely because she did not want us to even think of burdening ourselves.

The moment I had realized that I decided to not let her carry her liability alone anymore. She had done so much for us already, in my opinion there was absolutely no need for her to do anything more.

###

So, after it had taken me yet another two months to finally get the right idea on what to do, there finally came the day for me to act. Twice a week all of us went to the hot springs that were around ten miles to the north of our cave. Captain Miria, of course, never went there together with us, stating that she did not want to leave our cave without a guard. Honestly, she was so busy in acting as if she did not want to be around us that she was not even able to make up a proper excuse.

However, after we had agreed when to go there, Captain Miria stood behind, as always. After we had walked a few minutes, I pretended to have forgotten something and told my comrades that I had to go back and would catch up afterwards. Deneve had risen an eyebrow at that but didn't comment my lie that mostly was rather obvious in her eyes. For some reason she always knew what everyone was thinking. Sometimes that took scary scales. Out of my comrades she was the only one who seemed to know that something was going on that I did not want to tell the others about. For what reason I did not want to tell it, however, I had no clue at that time.

I eventually came back to our cave, where I found Miria, sitting at a small campfire, all on her own, as she most likely always did during our absence. It earned me a quite startled look of her as I entered the cave way earlier then expected.

"You... are early" she said, seeming a little bit puzzled.

I just greeted her with a warm smile. The cloth that I used as a towel I put onto the fells I used to sleep in back then.

"I decided to not go today" I answered her, before placing myself next to her.

She regarded me for a while with faint signs of disappointment in her face, before she turned her head away. That made me sigh. I had came back for her, not much to her liking, as it purported. Still, I had no reason to let that get to me. She was someone who needed a friend, even though she did not want to show it. But I had told myself to not let her shut off to the world, so I took the initiative.

Carefully paying attention to not address her as Captain - I wanted to be her friend, after all - I gently spoke her name.

Slightly her head turned into my direction again, but all I earned was a short look out of the corner of her eye, as she evenly said: "What have you come back for... didn't you want to bathe?"

She avoided my gaze, but I still directed it towards her to answer: "I thought of going together with you."

At that I clearly could see a small shock go through her body. A very short view out of her eye's corner met my gaze again, before she, slightly nervously, asked: "Why that all of a sudden?"

I took a deep, mental breath. I did of course not want to rush anything or to make her feel pressed. She, of course, had her reasons for not wanting to have anyone around, if possible. But that did not make things better for her, I could clearly see that, so I had no intentions of giving way, either. I had to think of something to make her feel more at ease, relaxed, you could say.

As I regarded my slightly trembling Captain a bit, I could feel the tension inside of her. At that, it was clear to me, that she had not have some time to really unbend her stressed body for about a week since she either had been busy training, getting supplies or taking care of our training in person, even though she rarely did the latter.

So it was clear to me, what to do. I placed myself behind her, kneeled down as close to her back as possible. Then I carefully rested my hands onto her shoulders and caringly began to rub them. Though she implausibly protested at first, she went quiet, as soon as I gently told her to close her eyes and to relax herself.

It actually only took me a few moments to completely make every sign of resistance in her vanish. It seemed like that was exactly what she had been needing. She let her back sink into my embrace and leaned her head into my right shoulder, letting out an infrasonic but yet very peaceful moan.

I had to smile at that. A deep happiness overcame me, as I saw what good I in fact could do to her with just a few words and gestures. I then closed my eyes too while starting to also let my hands rub over her arms occasionally.

As I even felt her face snuggle into the right side of my neck, I asked her flimsily: "Why so unapproachable at first?"

At that Miria's right hand grabbed my right hand and her left hand my left hand. Then she pulled them around her chest to huddle up into my embrace. Our eyes opened, just half-way, again. For a moment we kept sitting there like that, the right side of my face resting in her spiky hair.

As she kept quiet, I broke the silence after a while, as I caringly asked: "You seem... to not want to be around us, ain't I right?"

She then cuddled her head a little deeper into my shoulder, before answering: "It's not like I don't like you... It's just..."

"I know" I cut her off, startling her a little.

Being so close to her I could feel the warmth of her heart's beat pulsating through her body. It was irregular but strong. Her mind was still stirred up due to the events of Pieta but still she had not lost the ability to properly respond to the closeness of a friend. That was what her heartbeat told me. Even though it felt so strong, it still felt so lost – like a stranded hoping for rescue. I wanted to provide it to her, no matter what. I wanted to be the one to make her feel at ease again. That was the least that I could do for her.

"You know, Miria," I broke the silence again, "we can all understand, how you feel. And as of now, the seven of us are all that we have. I want you to be part of us, too."

My Captain's grip around my hands tightened. I could feel her pulse raise a little.

"I... don't want to burden you" she truthfully admitted and therefore confirmed my assumption. "I am fine with watching over you, so..."

"By being the lone wolf?" I cut her off yet again, making her bite her lower lip.

I ended our embrace and arose, took her hand and pulled her up. I had thought about what I was going to do before, but never felt so sure to do it as I felt then. I had to do it to divert her from everything that was on her mind.

Tenderly my left hand glided around the back of her neck to carefully pull her close to me. Ignoring the blush that appeared in her face as our faces were only inches away from each other I put my right index under her chin and pulled her face even closer to mine.

"Miria," I faintly whispered, "there is no way I can allow you to do that."

Before she got a proper chance to react, our lips met. At first I feared to have overdone it, because my Captain did not react at all, but then I felt her hands behind my back, pulling me closer. And then, while our tongues were fondling each other, I could feel her heartbeat again, as our chests were pushed against each other – it was exactly the same as mine.


	4. Chapter 3: Getting closer

_Author's notes:_

Disclaimer: Nope, hasn't been mine, isn't mine, won't be mine.

Thanks for the reviews I have gotten so far (and for the ones I hopefully will get in the future).

It took a little longer to update this time. Things that were keeping me busy were inter alia pizza, Claymore itself and Pro Pinball: Timeshock!

Enjoy!

**Chapter 3: Getting closer**

There are those moments in everyone's life. Those moments when you, in the heat of said moment, do something you have thought about many times, knowing, that there would eventually be the moment where it is not only appropriate to do it but also necessary to do it. And then, just seconds after you did it, you bitterly notice that you have not only irreversibly opened a door by ripping it off its hinges but also get the feeling that a certain person would never ever talk to you again.

Me, lands of the north, roughly four months after the war of Pieta. Captain Miria back then always tried to be away from the six lives that she had saved. On her shoulders she carried the whole weight of the war despite her being completely inculpable. I had watched her all the time and could, as well as everyone else, feel that she was suffering. I wanted to help her, so one evening, as everyone except Miria was on their way to the hot springs to take a bath I pretended to have forgotten something, and returned.

During my conversation with her everything went well: I got her to open up a little more and to have her affirm my assumption of her reasons to avoid the rest of us. Until the idea of kissing her popped into my mind again, everything was as I had wanted it to be. It was one of _those_ moments. In mere seconds I had unconsciously convinced myself that, by kissing her, I could at once clean her mind of all her burdens and problems. There were, however, two issues with my way of thinking.

The first issue was, that Miria's mind actually was not cleansed from its demons but that it was completely deranged. For a moment she had not reacted to my kiss at all and then, as I figured, she had one of _those_ moments, too, as she tightly hugged me while we were kissing. The second issue was, that I had not wasted a single thought on how I would be affected by kissing my Captain, the most important person in my life.

After our lips had parted we just stood there, still embracing each other, staring into our eyes with rather dull expressions. Bit by bit the both of us were realizing what we had done back then. It was not like the kiss itself was that much of a deal. The impact it had was.

I am pretty sure that I never ever have been so dumbfounded as I was back then again. I could not even think clearly, not to talk of being able to say something. My brain mercilessly was dismantling my mind by flooding it with memories of the kiss Captain Miria and I had shared. I could not feel Miria's pulse anymore, just my own that was getting stronger by the minute.

Miria had disengaged herself from our tight hug and, seeming unable to say something, too, gave me a resounding slap, turned around and left the cave at a hurried pace, leaving me totally thunderstruck.

###

I stood there for a while, face clueless, holding my left cheek that still was red from Captain Miria's slap. Every last gear in my brain was trying to process what had happened, and why. But it was not like something came out of it. Looking back at that time, today, I'd say my thinking back than was as useful as the machine that switches itself off just after you've switched it on.

Even as the others returned I could only stand there and stare at the ground. I saw Helen's hand waving in front of my face but I didn't react. I heard her shouting something like: "Hey, Deneve, Tabitha is broken!"

The latter only managed a sigh, took my right hand and dragged me out of the cave. I numbly followed her for what felt like a few hours until we finally stopped. And nothing happened. Until I was slapped in the face the second time that evening, on the other cheek.

Suddenly I somehow snapped out of my numbness and angrily shouted at her: "What was that for?"

"Well," she explained, "I have tried to talk to you on the whole way here."

At that I blushed and meekly said: "I... didn't notice."

"You don't say?" she answered before sitting down on a rock and slightly patting the spot to her right she commanded: "Sit down."

I was not really sure what was going on. It was fairly obvious that Deneve wanted to talk to me but I had no real idea what about. The moment I sat down next to her I suddenly realized how she and the other girls had found me and, knowing Deneve's mind reading skills I, was suddenly getting an unpleasant feeling about what she might have wanted to talk about.

"You seem to have a little trouble with our Captain" she briskly stated, catching me totally off guard because I had not anticipated her being that straight forward.

"I see," she said, having noticed the small twitch that had gone through my body.

I took a deep breath and said: "With _Captain_ Miria everything is fine. It just seems that I have done something to our _friend_ Miria." After a short pause I added: "How do you know anyways?"

Deneve then took a short, analyzing look to meet my eyes. It was that kind of look that made you turn away because you can feel that you are read like a book.

Her eyes wandered to nowhere again before she explained: "It is not hard to notice that you have some kind of... affection for Miria. You always try to be around her. You always have that caring face when you look at her. And well, today, as you pretended to have forgotten something, you could have just said: 'I want to be with Miria, see you later.' It would not have made the slightest difference."

I bit my lower lip and stared onto the snowy ground. 'Was my behavior that obvious?' I asked myself. And well, yes, it was. But still, I had no idea why I was trying to hide what I was doing for Miria. It would have been way easier if everyone could have taken care of her, still I never asked anyone for help.

"However," Deneve continued then, "considering the way you expressionlessly stood in the cave, holding your left cheek and being mentally absent, I guess that something went wrong. Have you been too straight forward?"

That was one of the moments I hated Deneve, but also one of the moments I loved her for. On the one hand she had – again – taken just a few minutes and a few looks to exactly know what had happened, as she always did. On the other hand she had given me an idea that I would never have gotten myself. And still, it made me feel even worse.

The conclusion I had come to was, that, what I had done, must have felt to her like me taking advantage of her mental state.

###

Without saying anything I ran off. I had to find Captain Miria and apologize. If my conclusion was correct I had to be one of the most despicable persons to her back then. But I wasn't, I just wanted to be there for her. At least that was what I believed.

Luckily my first hunch on where she might have been was right: the graves of the fallen. As I came closer I could already see her dark figure sitting in the snow, in pretty much the same fashion I found her the first time I tried to talk to her.

That time was different, however. I had way less of an idea what to say than the time before. All I knew was, that I had to apologize and to clear things up. I slowly walked up to her from behind and stopped just two meters away from her. She just sat there and stared onto the graveyard. It was so silent that I even could hear her breath. And she had to have been able to hear mine. Still, she didn't do or say anything. It was my turn, after all.

As I wanted to speak, however, Captain Miria leapfrogged me. "I am sorry" she said, leaving me puzzled. "I am sorry for how I have treated you. I did not know how to handle the situation, so I did something stupid."

She arose from her position and turned around to me. Her hands were folded as she looked at me with honesty: "Will you forgive me?"

I felt relieved. Even though I had told her that she must not blame herself for things she was not guilty of it gave me enough courage to apologize, too: "I also did something stupid. I kissed you on a whim. That was what led to this situation. I... did not really give it enough thought. I was afraid that you thought I was taking advantage of you, but please trust me, that I..."

I was cut off by Captain Miria who suddenly flung her arms around my neck and kissed me. For a moment I had no idea what to do, until I decided to just give in. My hands carefully found their ways to Captain Miria's waist to pull her just a little closer. It was exactly the same feeling as the time before. Everything on my mind suddenly was mixed into a colorful and warm feeling that soon had taken over my whole body.

After our lips parted I slowly opened my eyes to be met by the warm gaze of her silver eyes and a smile that I had not known of her before. After a few moments of silence she softly said: "I kissed you on a whim."

She then slowly winded herself out of our embrace and, giving me a last look, said: "It's time to go back, isn't it?"

She then started to walk away and, after a few meters, stopped again, turned her head around again and asked: "Won't you come?"


	5. Chapter 4: Lovesickness

_Author's notes:_

To think I'd dig out something this old, but reading Sarroush's new chapter of a warriors resolve brought me in the right mood to finally continue this fiction.

I had a lot of fun writing it even though it is 6 am, and so I hope that all of you will enjoy it.

More is to be expected, but for now:

Enjoy!

**Chapter 4: Lovesickness**

Have you ever encountered awkwardness? And by awkwardness I am not talking about a low level awkwardness, like going to the grocer and having forgot your money, or trying to say something during a group conversation and having forgotten about it the moment everyone is finally listening to you. I am talking about high-class awkwardness, but let's start from the beginning.

Things had gotten better between Miria and me, as well as Miria and everyone else. Though she did not do so all the time, she had started to eat with us regularly. She also had begun to spar with us personally every now and then, what soon led to even the weaker ones, in essence Yuma and me, to faster grow stronger. Also, what was the most surprising thing to me, she did not visit the graves of the fallen that often anymore, only about once a week. But there was one thing that made me happier than anything else:

She smiled.

Especially when she saw me.

Everything was great, you could say. But something did not feel right. It was not about her, it was about me. Whenever I was around her I got the very same feeling I had gotten the two times I had kissed her. I felt hot, my heartbeat became stronger and my brain ceased to work correctly. You could say that it felt like nearing your limits – but I didn't release Yoki at all.

The worst thing was that queasy feeling inside of my stomach. It was strange. The further away I was from Captain Miria, the more I wanted to be close to her, but the closer I came the worse my stomach felt. And to make it even worse I was absolutely unable to find a balance, what led to me ending up nearly randomly changing my mood from the one that made me want to be with Miria badly and the one that still made me want to be with her but also made me feel sick the moment I thought about her. I did not comprehend what was going on in the slightest.

It was one of those days, when I was in exactly that mood, that put me in a situation where I inwardly begged for the ground to swallow me.

###

I felt sick. The whole day I had done nothing else than sitting in our cave, cuddled into my fells, my brain switching between thinking about my Captain and, in favor of my stomach, trying to forget about her – what, in essence, made me think about her.

I could not say that I was unhappy with the changes I had managed to bring forth in Miria, the opposite was the case. But, even though I had kissed her only two times, my own way of seeing her had irreversibly changed. Today I know what that feeling was called, but back then I was completely clueless. I wanted to see her but I also wanted to not see her. And I never knew in which state I was.

However, that day was different. It was one of the worst I ever had. That queasy feeling I hated so much kept wandering from my stomach to my hearth and vice versa. I had no appetite, I could not bring myself to do anything and hence I had spent the whole day sitting there. Everyone else was still outside for training as my Captain entered the cave.

My heart jumped a little as I was greeted by her warm smile. I felt my body temperature rising a little while I looked at her smiling, for but a moment, before I had to avert my gaze.

But it was just that one, short moment of meeting her friendly gaze that suddenly had had me again. My senses hazed for but a moment, or so I thought, as I suddenly felt her cold hand on my forehead.

In front of me was Miria, on one knee, with one hand feeling my forehead and with her other hand feeling hers. Her gaze turned worried a little as she removed her hands and caringly said: "Your face is all red and your forehead is hot. Is really everything alright with you?"

Yes, that was true. I had told her that I was alright in the morning and that I just needed a little rest. I had no intentions on burdening her with how I really felt. Believing to know that feeling and that it would leave after a few hours already, I thought that I could just sit it out. I had not anticipated for it to get so much worse on that day.

"Really," my Captain said, wonder mixing into her worried face, "I really did not think that we warriors could become sick."

She placed herself next to me and laid an arm around my shoulders and pulled me a little closer. Her free hand gently touched my cheek and turned my view towards hers.

As I met her warm gaze that was overflowing with worry I melted away. "Is really everything alright with you?" she asked me as if she feared I would die on her.

If the both of us had known that everything that was wrong with me was nothing more than my body and mind wanting to love Miria with everything I had things would have been easier. But what were we supposed to know?

Still, at that moment everything that was there was her warm gaze. She said a few more things, but I heard less of them by the minute. There it was again. That warm, colorful feeling that I had felt before while kissing her. The absolute absence of any piece of rationality in my mind. The pure longing for her closeness.

Without thinking – literally – I could do nothing but to fling my arms around her neck and kiss her yet again. All the tension that had built up inside of me suddenly flew out of my body, relaxing me in a way I had never felt before.

My beloved Captain was startled at first, but then closed her eyes, let her arms slide around my waist and pulled me even closer.

We were falling to the ground from our sitting position, directly on Miria's own fells and there we remained, repeatedly kissing each other for what do I know how long until our lips finally parted.

I did not comprehend it back then, but suddenly I felt all better. That stupid queasy feeling in my stomach was gone. I still felt a little hot and my heart still beat as though it wanted to explode, but suddenly it all felt pleasant.

Our faces were only inches away as I realized that both of us were breathing heavily. Her face had a visible blush that made her look beautiful to no end.

"Wow," she suddenly said, chuckling a little, "that was a surprise."

"Indeed" the both of us suddenly heard Helen say.

We looked to the cave's entrance to find our five friends standing there. One of Clare's eyebrows was raised slightly, Cynthia's mouth was opened slightly while Helen's jaw had hit the floor and Yuma shyly switched between looking at us and the ground, having an even redder face than Miria. Only Deneve did not show any sign of surprise.

And that was exactly the moment I inwardly begged for the ground to swallow the both of us.

Endles minutes passed until Deneve suddenly said: "I guess that we should go back to training for a little longer."

Clare, Yuma and Cynthia nodded in agreement, turned around and left, while Deneve took the hand of a very thunderstruck Helen and dragged her out.

As everyone had left our gazes met again. We could read in each others eyes very precisely how the both of us felt in that moment.

Again, minutes that felt like hours were passing before Miria suddenly began to snicker.

"Have you... seen... their faces?" she brought out bit by bit before she began to laugh lustily. For a reason incomprehensible to me I had to join in. Then the both of us were – literally – rolling over the floor laughing while we tossed and turned in both of our fells, still engaged in a deep embrace.

###

After a while the both of us lay next to each other, facing the ceiling of the cave, breathing heavily.

"Do you feel better?" Miria asked me while still trying to catch her breath.

"Yeah" I answered. "I have never felt better."


End file.
